Re: CHAT: silly names, prepositions

Am 03/22 00:20  Adam Walker yscrifef:
> Me too!  There is one and ONLY one acceptable self-designation for citizens
> of the United States of AMERICA, and that is American.  You may call us
> whatever you wish when speaking of us in French or German or Swahili or
> Russian or Spanish, but when speaking to us in English PLEASE have the
> courtesy to call us by our self-designation!!!  Call me an estadoeunidienso
> (or whatever) in Spanish if you so desire (We call no one by their
> self-designations either.), but when speaking English call me an American.
> How incredibly arrogant to try to force another people to change their name
> for themselves!!!
>
Do they really?  Kudos for the person who can tell me the international
name for the country that is known in its indigenous language as Viti.

I can assure you that I do call the citizens of USA Americans.  After
200 years it's waste of time trying to change the language.  Wasn't it
Benjamin Franklin who popularised the term with the statement "We are
all Americans", meaning the residents of what was then British colonies.
This may prove to have been short-sighted, but, maybe, not yet.

Two things concern me.

One of the privileges about being an American is that you get a bigger
stick than I do.  Even if you don't use it on me, it is always going to
be there.  There is a hint of coercion here.

There is also a hint of conformity.  Do Americans get an alternative if
they want to opt out of being identified as a member of the American
cultural superstratum?  I know that in New Zealand there are people who
identify themselves as New Zealander as their ethnicity.  They want to
see themselves as normative and those others who want to re-address the
issues of post-colonial justice as disruptive.  So there may be problems
as identifying yourself as just one thing and then expecting everyone
else to do the same, even among your own nation-group.

Well that was interesting although I expect I'm way off topic for this
list.

- andrew.
--
Andrew Smith, Intheologus                       hobbit@earthlight.co.nz

Lent: Living in Borrowed Time

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